sign for bagpipe: for the visitors it signified chicken. On New Year’s Eve they ran into a large group of Australian deaf at the Moreton Bay island of Tangalooma where we went to participate in feeding the dolphins. It was a joy to watch the ‘natives’ and ‘foreigners’ communicate with such obvious sympathy and exuberance. I’m not at all certain Australia’s so-called multicultural society has as yet achieved similar social harmony and warmth.
I think it might be appropriate to briefly interrupt my friend’s narrative and insert a short paragraph from a newspaper article of 15 July 1945. It reads: ‘The US military government in Germany has announced in Frankfurt that since Germany’s unconditional surrender on 7 and 8 May more than 70 000 former officials of the Nazi regime have been arrested in the US occupation zone and sent to various internment camps. The following persons are subject to automatic arrest: members of the SS, SD and Gestapo, further Ortsgruppenführer (local Nazi group leaders) and higher party officials, former burgomasters, Kreis and district leaders of the NSDAP as well as senior public servants and officers of the Armed Forces.’
I offer no commentary except to say that this piece of historical information might assist in assessment of the role my friend’s grandfather may have played in Manfred’s life. I can’t believe he’ll keep quiet about it.
Who is this guy interrupting our talk? Or am I imagining it? Are the shrinks right — am I beginning to hear voices? Oh, it’s the intercom again! I thought I was promised peace and quiet. What’s the matter with this contraption? There goes the buzzer again!
‘Hello? This is room forty. I’m the new arrival. Hello!’ Is this some kind of psychological experiment, a challenge to my nerves or just plain bloody rude? I should have hung up immediately. Or better still, not answered at all. What are they trying to do to me in this allegedly humane institute?
Oh, I see! This time it was the door!
‘Yes?’ What could an attractive young woman want from me? If this is what Humanitas nurses look like, I may have to reconsider my response to staff. She doesn’t even wear a uniform, but a rather elegant knee-length yellow dress. My God! A yellow dress and her black hair! She’s a stunner!
‘Good evening, Professor! I’m Geraldine Stearn. Would you like me to accompany you to dinner? It’s being served right now. I thought perhaps you might enjoy company on your first night.’
Is this a trick, a trap to make me say or do something I don’t want to? Fancy using a beautiful woman to lure me into a false sense of security! It may not be the most ethical way of forcing a patient to reveal himself, but there’s no denying what’s-her-name really is striking.
‘There’s no need to wear a jacket,’ she informs me with an unnerving smile. ‘Just take your key. I’ll wait at the door.’ She actually steps back at bit to indicate she’s ready to go. Suddenly I hear myself say: ‘I won’t be a minute’, as I turn round and fetch the card that opens the door to my suite. Out in the corridor the young woman beckons to me good-naturedly as she leads the way. What makes me think she might actually take my hand?
Trying to say something, I offer a rather foolish and self-righteous comment. ‘I thought you’d know the rooms don’t actually have keys. They must have found it easier to control inmates with security cards.’
As we approach the lift she asks: ‘How do you like your suite? It has a wonderful view over the park.’
I’m trying to remember her name. In the lift we stand close to each other, and I can see a small ornamental nametag near her left breast. ‘Ms G. Stearn’, it reads, as if no further establishment of identity were necessary. I inhale the tangy scent of her perfume.
Slightly aroused, I remember her last question and say, ‘The view’s great.’ Ms Stearn’s response is another wry smile.
We reach the downstairs lobby from where she leads me to the restaurant. It’s located in the left wing of the ground floor. Decorated in Mediterranean style, many tables look out to colourful flowerbeds and an ornamental fountain featuring an ancient sculpture I don’t recognise. ‘It’s our Eros statue,’ my hostess or chaperone casually informs me after we’ve been seated. What precisely is Ms Stearn’s position, I wonder. ‘Not quite the size of the one at London’s Piccadilly Circus,’ she adds apologetically.
I don’t know why that remark irritates me and even less what makes me say: ‘That’s true. When I was still at high school I once met a beautiful girl there on a school trip. She was from Cardiff and had the most wonderful name. Aniquita. Because we thought we’d fallen in love I later visited her family in Wales. She considered herself engaged after that. But I never saw her again.’ Suddenly I feel my face redden. Here I am suspecting my hostess — if that’s what she is — of trying to make me say things the doctors might find useful in their treatment, blathering a load of nonsense about my misspent youth! My quick glance to check Ms Stearn’s reaction remains unsuccessful. She’s busy studying the menu. Or pretending to. My drivel is met with tactful or scornful silence. She probably thinks I’m a ladies’ man boasting, or worse, chatting her up!
For a moment we’re both silent. Suddenly I too begin to show an intense interest in the menu. Better concentrate on the Italian dishes.
She’s decided and turns to me. ‘You can trust this place,’ she tries to assure me, but in fact I’m only startled. So she really is someone sent to soften me up! ‘Especially if you like to eat Italian.’
How little it takes to turn me into a fool! Is that part of the alleged illness I’m suffering? But perhaps gorgeous Ms Stearn is just covering up her real role at Humanitas. After ordering our meals she says: ‘As this is your first night, how about sharing a bottle of Australian wine? It’s on the house.’ Her voice, along with her body language, oozes confidence. There’s no doubt, she’s in control here. I’m hovering between suspicion and impatience with myself. What if she’s really just trying to be friendly? It takes more than a bottle of wine to put me off my guard. This time we make prolonged eye contact. She looks at me as if she has nothing to hide. ‘Why not?’ I hear myself say. Then both of us burst out laughing as if in relief.
‘You’re Australian, aren’t you?’ Ms Stearn responds. It’s not a question but the statement of someone who knows what she’s talking about. I suddenly realise everything she’s said to me so far was in the same confident tone. By contrast, whatever I’m saying sounds evasive and hesitant, even to me.
‘Yes, but I wasn’t born there.’ I’m tempted to add that home is not always where one is born, but decide against it. The shrinks would have a field day.
‘I gathered that. When did you settle there?’ Again, her question seems to be purely social, expressing a friendly interest in the newcomer. Why, then, do I project more into it, suspect that she may be gathering information about me in a casual social encounter? I decide to remain cautious.
‘A long time ago.’ Our conversation is beginning to assume the character of a game of chess. What does she really want to know? Irritated by her irony, I decide to turn aggressive, employing my rooks on both flanks, as it were, in an attempt to tear open the opponent’s defences. ‘Is this talk part of the Institute’s biotherapy?’ I ask bluntly.
The question amuses Ms Stearn more than my refusal to let her know the exact date of my arrival in Australia. Her laughter is positively joyous, sparkling with exuberance. She’s
